Lawyer May Run But Can't Hide

Theft Case Hounds Oak Brook Attorney

The state agency that oversees lawyers' conduct is attempting to disbar an elusive Oak Brook attorney accused of stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from clients.

The Illinois Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission will hold a preliminary hearing in the case of Donald Phares on Jan. 8, despite the difficulty of serving him with notification papers.

If Phares does not show up, the commission has the authority to schedule and conduct a hearing in his absence.

"If he doesn't choose to answer and respond, that doesn't stop us," said James Grogan, chief counsel for the commission. "We'll just move faster."

The 64-year-old lawyer faces three counts of misconduct for allegedly taking money clients gave him to invest or place in trusts.

In one case, a Naples, Fla., man and his brother-in-law reported losing more than $100,000 in proceeds from the sale of a building in Mundelein.

According to a complaint filed with the commission, James Doane and his brother-in-law, William Bowman, asked Phares to place the money in a trust until they could complete a deal to buy another building.

Doane said he later learned the money had never been placed in the trust.

"I talked to him after I found out, and he kept saying he was going to pay me back," Doane said. "But I never got the money."

The complaint also contends that Phares took more than $284,000 from Fred Bennett, a Rockford man who asked the attorney to invest about $800,000 in prime bank notes at European and Japanese banks.

Phares also represented Bennett's mother, Barbara Legg Bennett, who allegedly asked Phares to create a $150,000 trust fund that would pay her two grandsons $1,000 a month each.

Phares made the payments from November 1991 to last April but has distributed no money to the grandsons since, according to the complaint.

The Bennetts have been unable to obtain information about the missing money from Phares, the complaint states.

Phares has been hard to find since the allegations surfaced.

Unable to locate Phares at his River Forest home or his Oak Brook office, the commission arranged for sheriff's deputies in Richmond, Ind., to deliver the papers to his wife, Dorothy, at work there.

That was insufficient, however, so on Tuesday the commission mailed the papers to five addresses Phares frequented or at which he lived.

That action, said Grogan, qualifies as reasonable notice.

Phares did not return phone calls to his office.

His wife and son, Donald Phares Jr., declined to talk about the case.

Grogan said that if Phares does not present a reasonable explanation at next month's meeting, he almost will certainly be disbarred.

Moreover, he could face criminal charges.

"When we're dealing with matters of substantial misconduct, we're more than happy to cooperate with state and federal investigators," Grogan said.